The Shadows

Description

The Shadows by George MacDonald is a timeless classic of the genre of the fairy tale – a magical story for adults that makes the reader laugh and also gives hope that everything can turn out for the best eventually.

The principle character of the story is a writer of comic sketches, Ralph Rinkelmann, who is chosen by the fairies to be their king. However, his coronation takes place among strange circumstances – the fairies kidnap Rinkelmann while he is ill and helpless. The story then shifts to the Shadows from the title of the story – black creatures with pristine white souls, who spend their time casting shadows that dance on walls. Their appearance can have various motivations – they might come and form on the wall to make a man repent the evil he has done, they may appear to entertain a sickly young boy or to inspire a dramatist to write.

The Shadows is considered by many to be one of the best stories by MacDonald. Imaginative and beautifully written, eventful and exciting, moving and well-structured, the story presents the Shadows as agents of the good, rather than evil creatures, but this is not the only unusual feature of the story. Though the plot retains all the compulsory components of fairy stories – the existence of a fairy universe parallel to the real world, a protagonist with a problem that allows the reader to identify with and that is remedied with the help of fairies – it also has a few components that makes the story really unusual, such the choice of the fairies to crown a sickly human to be their king.

The Shadows is not only a complex story, however – it is also a very entertaining tale that will make you laugh at points and will surely make you contemplate life and death as well.
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